weekly hansard - Queensland Parliament - Queensland Government

23 Aug 2005 Plumbing and Drainage and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2625
I come back to the legislation that we are debating today and this whole question of the use of
recycled water. I do believe that by the time we are looking for another water supply to put into our
system, technology and community attitudes will have changed towards this question of the use of
recycled water. It is very timely that today in the Courier-Mail there is a very interesting article by Dr
Philip Williams, who is a senior lecturer in the School of Environmental Engineering at Griffith University.
The article makes the point very well that there are more opportunities for water recycling, and that is
the reuse of treated waste water, both the grey water we are talking about and black water, which is the
sewage. The article states—
Only a relatively small fraction of our wastewater is recycled now—for golf courses, industry and agriculture. The community is
strongly in favour of these types of uses, presumably because the benefits are obvious and there is no personal contact.
‘Indirect potable reuse’ is another possibility, where treated wastewater effluent would be piped back to the water supply source.
This is well down the list of water recycling priorities and virtually is not practised in Australia—primarily because of adverse public
reaction.
The usual response to proposed schemes or any possible hint that wastewater effluent is linked to drinking water is an immediate
case of the ‘yuk’ factor (faecal aversion, in more scientific terms).
I have certainly encountered that myself. The article continues—
Unfortunately, few people are bothering to think about the issues. Singapore is an overseas exception where a small amount of
treated wastewater is mixed into the water supply lake.
That is something that I have been aware of for some time. I can only commend that particular
approach. I think we will need to consider, both in south-east Queensland and across the state, putting
recycled water back into our dams. Then we have all of the processes of water treatment to ensure the
quality of the water we have already put in the dam, which would be very high.
Mr Shine interjected.
Dr LESLEY CLARK: I am glad to hear the member. I take that interjection, because I think that is
the future. It is not some airy-fairy, pie-in-the-sky idea; it is used in other countries. It can be used here.
Just yesterday I was speaking with the minister for natural resources about this very issue. I am
encouraged by his willingness to consider this option and to take the community with us as we discuss
these opportunities. Hopefully, we can get beyond the ‘yuk factor’ which, as I say, we have seen in the
US where these schemes have been scuttled. People have run scare campaigns on ‘toilet to tap’. That
is really a gross exaggeration. It does not reflect at all what can be achieved with this sort of technology.
I believe that, with this legislation and with a raft of other initiatives that this government is
bringing forward, we will move into an era of a much more sustainable use of our water supply. We will
be able to meet the challenges of the droughts that we are experiencing and climate change—all of
those issues that we face in the future.
I encourage all local authorities to continue to work really closely with the government. Again, I
commend the minister for her dual portfolios of Environment and Local Government. As she knows, that
places her so well to deal with these issues now and into the future. I look forward to us in Cairns
grappling with these issues in a way that is good for the environment and good for the ratepayers’
bottom line. With those words, I commend the bill to the House.
Ms NOLAN (Ipswich—ALP) (7.43 pm): I rise to speak briefly in support of this bill brought to the
House by the minister for environment. It is long-awaited. I know that the minister has been doing some
good work on this bill for a while now. It is really good to see it culminate, because this minister for
environment made it a priority and made it happen. So I really congratulate her on that.
The bill should be seen in conjunction with the Sustainable Housing Policy which, in terms of
water use, mandates dual-flush toilets and AAA rated shower roses, which have the capacity to save us
about 16,000 litres of water per household per year. The Sustainable Housing Policy also mandates
water pressure limiting devices.
In the period of just a couple of generations our attitudes towards the environment and our use of
resources have changed enormously. This is going to sound very down home, but it is also pertinent. I
talked to my grandma about what it was like when she grew up. My grandma grew up just outside
Warwick. It is hardly the end of the earth. She is now just over 80. When my grandma was a young
woman her family did not have a car, so she would walk or ride a horse to wherever she wanted to go.
Going into Warwick was an enormously big deal. There was no electricity at her home. So the only
refrigeration was by means of an icebox. When my grandma was growing up, once the water tank at
their farmhouse went dry that was it; there was simply no more water. So my grandma grew up—and
this is only two generations ago; it is hardly a particularly long time ago—in an environment where the
maintenance and protection of limited resources were absolutely central to the way in which all people
lived their lives.
In two generations, those attitudes have changed enormously. By the time of my mother’s
generation, we were so resource rich that the waste of resources such as oil, water and paper in the
office became almost a celebration of affluence. I know people who are my mother’s age who really
object to the notion of recycling paper in an office because it is somehow an imposition on those signs of